Right Thinking from the Left Coast

Tag: heart attacks

For decades, policy makers have tried and failed to get Americans to eat less salt. In April 2010 the Institute of Medicine urged the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to regulate the amount of salt that food manufacturers put into products; New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg has already convinced 16 companies to do so voluntarily. But if the U.S. does conquer salt, what will we gain? Bland french fries, for sure. But a healthy nation? Not necessarily.

This week a meta-analysis of seven studies involving a total of 6,250 subjects in the American Journal of Hypertension found no strong evidence that cutting salt intake reduces the risk for heart attacks, strokes or death in people with normal or high blood pressure. In May European researchers publishing in the Journal of the American Medical Association reported that the less sodium that study subjects excreted in their urine—an excellent measure of prior consumption—the greater their risk was of dying from heart disease. These findings call into question the common wisdom that excess salt is bad for you, but the evidence linking salt to heart disease has always been tenuous.

The problem isn’t salt: its genetics and bad habits. Sodium Chloride consumption is critical to help the body do a lot of things. I have believed that reducing it drastically as we are being told to do, was going to do more harm than good, and it looks like the science – real science – is now proving that. I also want to mention that I read a study a while back linking the massive rise in depression to the fact we where telling people to consume a lot less alt and to totally avoid the sun (vitamin D), both essential to keeping a healthy chemical balance necessary for mental stability.

BTW, this issue with salt was one of the things, like eggs, that for over a decade we where told the science had settled. They where wrong of course, and the scientific process, allowed to run its course, proved that. Enjoy that salt. It is good for you. I just wish we could hold the assholes that peddled this junk science accountable for screwing us all over for this long. My guess is they will just be given a pass.